Saturday, March 1, 2014

Out of nowhere, a reborn Upshaw helps a program rebuild

There’s no shortage of statistical evidence—nor
methodology—to indicate just how good Zeke Upshaw has been for the Flying
Dutchmen this season.

In terms of raw numbers, he is the second-leading scorer in the
CAA at 19.7 points per game. He has scored a higher percentage of his team’s
points—29.2 percent—than anyone in the top 10.

He has scored at least 25 points in eight games. For an idea
of how impressive that is, Charles Jenkins had nine 25-point games as a senior
three years ago.

Presuming he scores at least nine points in the next two
games, Upshaw will finish with the highest scoring average for any graduate
transfer ever. Of course, “ever” is a rather dramatic and misleading term,
given that the graduate transfer rule—in which a player who has graduated may play
immediately after transferring to another school that features a major not
offered by the school from which he got his undergraduate degree—was only
instituted prior to the 2011-12 season.

But Upshaw’s feat will not likely be diminished by the
increasing pool of graduate transfers in the coming years. Division I rosters
featured 46 graduate transfers this season, up from 15 two years ago. Nor is it
likely that any future graduate transfer will match the dramatic ascent Upshaw
authored in going from end-of-the-bench afterthought at Illinois State to
superstar at Hofstra.

Upshaw averaged 1.6 points per game in 62 career games over
three years at Illinois State. Of the 94 other graduate transfers, only nine
averaged less than 1.6 points per game at their previous stop. And none of
those nine averaged more than nine points per game as a graduate transfer.

“This couldn’t have happened at a better time for me,”
Upshaw said this week.

Nor could he have happened at a better time for Hofstra,
which, a year removed from the bleakest moments in the history of its men’s
basketball program, had an impossible-to-quantify need for a feel-good tale
such as Upshaw’s.

“It’s a great story—it’s as good a story in college
basketball as there is, I think,” Joe Mihalich said. “I don’t know what else
would be.”

This great story has not been without its challenging
moments for its main characters, who came together at their most vulnerable
times.

At Illinois State, Upshaw drew the dreaded “DNP-CD” 37
times. He was impressive in the few opportunities he did receive: Upshaw scored
at least seven points seven times for the Redbirds and, in consecutive games
last season, scored nine points on three late 3-pointers against Indiana State
before collecting a career-high 11 points against national power Creighton.

“For not playing [much] the previous two or three years
before that and having games like that against Creighton and a good team like
Indiana State, that definitely gave me motivation to keep going (as well as)
confidence,” Upshaw said.

That confidence was tested when Upshaw played in just 10 of
the Redbirds’ final 19 games, a stretch in which he scored a total of 15
points.

“That sort of defined the whole year, because it was up and
down,” Upshaw said. “My coach, he’s a good coach, but he was up and down the
whole year with rotations.”

By the end of the season, Upshaw became aware of the
graduate transfer option and switched majors—from apparel, merchandising and
design to university studies—so that he could get his degree and play somewhere
else this season.

Weeks later, Mihalich was walking out of his new office at
Hofstra when his cell phone rang. It was Chicago-based Joe Henricksen, the
founder of the Hoops Report scouting service and a longtime friend of
Mihalich’s.

At his introductory press conference, Mihalich said he realized
he had to find some players in a hurry but that he was already used to being
thorough in recruiting after spending more than a decade at upstate Niagara.

“We’re going to recruit anywhere and everywhere,” Mihalich
said April 10. “You answer every email and you make every phone call. You look
at every tape that comes in. And if there’s a genuine mutual interest, you
pursue it.”

Still, he probably didn’t expect to have to go to the
lengths that Jay Wright did in 1994, when, in the pre-Internet era, he pursued
players sight unseen to fill out his first Flying Dutchmen roster.

“Joe [says] ‘I think I’ve got a kid for you,’” Mihalich said.

After learning more about Upshaw and watching game footage
of him on the Synergy Sports Tech website, Mihalich figured he was a talented
player who slipped through the cracks because of coaching changes—he had been
recruited to Illinois State by head coach Tim Jankovich and assistant coach
Paris Parham, who left after the 2011-12 season to take assistant jobs at SMU
and Illinois, respectively—and the misfortune of being stuck behind NBA
prospect Jackie Carmichael.

The lure of ample playing time drew Upshaw to Hofstra, which
he committed to shortly after visiting in the early summer. Pickup ball over
the next few months made it clear he would be one of the go-to players on a
team bereft of scoring options.

“We just needed a guy who was a good scorer,” Mihalich said.
“We do it every year—who’s going to get what. How many points is Dion Nesmith
going to score? How many points will Moussa Kone score?”

And how many points would Upshaw score?

“I think we figured we’d get about 12,” Mihalich said. “So
we were wrong.”

It took until the fourth game of the season for Mihalich to
realize how wrong he’d been. Upshaw scored 46 points over the first three games
but gave no indication he’d be anything more than a solid if unspectacular
place-holder.

He cramped in the second half of the season opener, when the
Dutchmen blew a 13-point lead in losing to Monmouth, 88-84. Early foul trouble
against Fairleigh Dickinson two days later limited Upshaw to eight minutes and
seven points. And he wasn’t the Dutchmen’s most impressive player against
defending national champion Louisville on Nov. 12 when Upshaw scored 17 points
and pulled down six rebounds while Nesmith had 24 points, six assists and one
steal.

But at Richmond on Nov. 19, Upshaw scored 37 points—only the
19th time in school history a player has collected at least 37
points in a game—as the Dutchmen never trailed in regulation before losing in
overtime.

“I never played Richmond before, but I was familiar with the
team—they’re always known for having good defensive teams and going to the
[NCAA] Tournament,” Upshaw said. “Scoring that much against them definitely
gave me confidence for the rest of the year.”

That effort also ratcheted up the pressure placed upon
Upshaw by Mihalich, who began placing superstar demands on a player less than a
year removed from spending his nights in warm-ups at the end of the bench.
Finally, after an ugly 86-67 loss to Fairleigh Dickinson in Hackensack, Upshaw
pleaded for a little understanding.

“There was a time I was hard on him—really hard on him,”
Mihalich said “After that terrible loss to FDU, I brought every player in and
talked to them one-on-one. He said ‘Coach, I’m not used to this.’ And it almost
made me feel bad, because it was so short-sighted of me to not realize, you know
what, the poor kid isn’t used to this: Being the best player, playing 38
minutes a game, having to be the leader, asking him to play defense, asking him
to rebound.

“I realized I probably needed to back off a little bit of
the veins-popping-out-of-your-forehead for letting your guy blow by you once in
a while.”

Upshaw responded to Mihalich’s lighter touch by ratcheting
up his play and putting the Dutchmen on his back as conference season began. In
15 CAA games, he has scored at least 20 points nine times, played 40 minutes 10
times and twice tied the school record for 3-pointers in a game (seven against
UNC Wilmington and William & Mary).

He has more points in the last four games (107) than he did
in three years at Illinois State (100). He has hit all 19 of his free throw
attempts in the last two games, the most consecutive free throws by a Hofstra
player since Mike Moore in 2010-11 and two more free throws than Upshaw
converted for the Redbirds.

There have not been a lot of wins—heading into tonight’s home
finale. the Dutchmen (4-11 CAA, 8-22 overall) have lost nine of their last 10 and
are locked into the outbracket game of the CAA tournament next Friday against
UNC Wilmington—but Upshaw’s play has helped define a team that has developed an
endearing grittiness in losing 10 games by seven points or less, including each
of its last three.

In bursting on to the scene with a flurry as impressive as
it is brief, he has also helped hasten the healing process for a program and a fan
base devastated by the disastrous events of last season.

“I want the student section to fill back up for these guys,”
Upshaw said. “I take a lot of pride in getting that, and sort of rebuilding and
re-healing the attitude of everybody—all the fans and everybody around
Hofstra.”

It is impossible not to note the juxtaposition between
Upshaw, who arrived with zero expectations and is thriving within the spirit of
a relatively new rule that could be easily exploited by those with impure
intentions, and the hotly hyped transfers who squandered second chances in
destroying the Dutchmen last season.

The rebuilding and the rebirth has begun with a player who
will be positively associated with Hofstra for far longer than he actually
played here.

“Illinois State is a great school and I loved my time
there,” Upshaw said. “But I feel like I’ve done more work here and everything
has been great here. So, yeah, I’ll definitely be wearing my Hofstra shirts for
the rest of my life.”

He hopes to be wearing those shirts overseas, where he plans
to pursue professional opportunities this summer. But first, there’s a Senior
Night more than 900 miles east of Illinois State, followed by at least two more
chances to play 40 minutes and rack up 20-plus points. Who could have imagined
that a year ago?

“Great story—just a great story,” Mihalich said. “I hope for
his sake it has a happy ending of some sort. I don’t know how you define that.
Winning the 8/9 game and then playing your whatever off [against the top seed a
week from today]? I don’t know. I hope for his sake this can have a happy
ending this year.”